Three Generations in Jaipur: Is This Mobility or Just a Better Job?
In a Jaipur family, the grandfather was a village carpenter from an OBC community and never completed primary school. The father studied to class 12, trained as a teacher, and retired as a government school headmaster. His son is a software engineer in Bengaluru earning around ₹18 lakh a year and has bought a flat on a loan. The son's marriage was arranged within the same caste and gotra, though the bride's family is urban and wealthier. The daughter, a pharmacist, married into a trading family; her in-laws checked the gotra before agreeing. The family sold its ancestral agricultural land in 2015 and says, 'Now caste does not matter; only education and money matter.' A cousin who dropped out of school still works as a carpenter in the village and says the family has 'forgotten its roots'.
1. Distinguish the occupational and class mobility in this family from caste mobility. Use the three generations as evidence.
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The family shows clear occupational and class mobility. The grandfather's manual occupation and low schooling gave way to salaried teaching and then to a high-wage professional job. Income, education, housing and consumption have all moved upward across generations. That is intergenerational mobility in class terms.
But class mobility is not the same as caste mobility. Caste mobility would mean a change in the family's position within the caste order, or a weakening of caste boundaries in marriage, kinship and social interaction. Here the evidence points the other way: the son's marriage was arranged within caste and gotra, and the daughter's in-laws verified gotra before consenting. The family has changed its occupation while retaining its caste boundary.
Two qualifications matter. First, the upward mobility was enabled partly by reservation and public-sector employment, which are caste-related routes, not evidence that caste has disappeared. Second, the cousin who remained a carpenter shows that mobility is selective within the same kin group. The family's success is not a community-wide trend.
So the accurate conclusion is: substantial class mobility, limited caste mobility, and continued caste endogamy in the most sensitive domain, marriage.
2. Why does marriage remain caste-endogamous even when occupation and income have changed? Give a reasoned explanation.
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Marriage is not simply an economic transaction; it is the point where family status, kinship networks and property are reproduced. Several mechanisms explain persistence.
- Status maintenance. A wealthy urban bride's family may accept a poorer but same-caste groom because caste similarity protects social standing. Checking gotra is a way of ruling out close kin and asserting ritual purity, not an economic calculation.
- Network effects. Arranged marriage operates through kin and caste associations. Even highly educated families rely on these networks, so the search itself reproduces endogamy.
- Honour and risk aversion. Inter-caste marriage can invite social pressure, violence or withdrawal of community support. Families weigh that risk against the uncertain benefits of breaking the boundary.
- Property and inheritance. Endogamy keeps land, business and ritual obligations within a known circle, even after agricultural land is sold.
- Socialisation. Preferences are formed early; people often say they are 'not casteist' while still preferring a same-caste match.
This is why the family's claim that 'only education and money matter' is only partly true. Education and money changed the family's class position, but the marriage market still uses caste as a trust and status signal. Endogamy is not a leftover that automatically disappears with education; it is actively reproduced.
3. Evaluate the claim that 'caste no longer matters' using the evidence and the distinction between caste and class.
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The claim is too strong, but it captures a real change. The evidence supports a partial conclusion.
On the 'matters less' side, the family's occupation, income and residence are no longer determined by caste in the way the grandfather's were. Education and salaried employment have opened routes that were closed to the grandfather. Urban living and the sale of land reduce everyday caste dependence.
On the 'still matters' side, the two marriages are the decisive evidence. Both were arranged within caste, and gotra was explicitly checked. The family's social circle, marriage network and ritual obligations remain caste-shaped. The cousin's continued carpentry also shows that the benefits of mobility are unevenly distributed within the kin group.
The analytical error in the claim is to treat caste as if it were only an occupation system. Caste also operates through marriage, kinship, honour, networks and political mobilisation. A family can achieve class mobility while remaining caste-endogamous. That combination is common, not contradictory.
A better formulation: caste has weakened as a determinant of occupation and has persisted as a determinant of marriage and social boundaries. The claim is therefore half-true, and the half it ignores is the sociologically important one.